


forte

by vailserenity



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28473582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vailserenity/pseuds/vailserenity
Summary: The point is, she’s fourteen, and she’s a little bit lost. Fig doesn’t know what she wants. She just wants more. She needs a key change, and fast, because she's drowning in a persona and she doesn't know what's underneath.(a study on Figueroth Faeth, music, and her relationship with her identity)
Relationships: Ayda Aguefort/Figueroth Faeth
Comments: 1
Kudos: 18
Collections: D20 Gift Exchange 2020





	forte

**Author's Note:**

> hey ! happy holidays ! this is my d20 exchange gift to @jackcats_ on twt ! i hope u enjoy !! just some fig things <3

Growing up, Fig’s favorite music is anything she can get her hands on. She’ll hear a song once on the radio, and shout enthusiastically to the chorus the next time it starts. Her mother buys FIg a vinyl player for her tenth birthday, and any pretentiousness brought on by being a pre-teen with a _vinyl player_ is outweighed by how cool it is. 

So, yeah, it’s safe to say Fig loves music. 

When she’s that young, she doesn’t listen to music for it’s technical make-up, or hum tunes with the intent to replicate them perfectly for an audience, she just loves the sound. It’s easy to lose herself in other people’s words and other people’s tunes.

(Looking back, she’s not sure when or where it started, but Fig has preferred to lose herself in other people or things for a long time.)

When she’s eleven, she starts cheerleading. The soundtrack to her life becomes the most popular teen-pop at a given moment, whatever their dance routines are set to, and the snickers of girls trying too-hard to play into movie-cheerleader stereotypes at such a young age. When she’s twelve, she has her first crush. This crush happens to be on a girl, which is neither an issue or a surprise, but definitely an _oh_ moment. She counts it as her first rebellion, and doesn’t let a single soul know.

She’s thirteen, and she’s _nice_ . Her friends, teachers and acquaintances all say the same thing, _oh, Fig, she’s such a nice girl. She’s very sweet._ At this stage, Fig revels in a supposedly uncomplicated happiness. It’s a little shallow, extremely surface-level; after all, she spends her time listening to music that other people like, and there’s no-one she trusts to tell about her crush, or the fact that it was on a girl. People tell her she’s nice, that she seems happy, and they are, in a sense, _right_ . She’s not _unhappy_ , by any means, but any happiness she feels is tinged with an unexplainable superficiality. Fig is thirteen years old, and she’s satisfied, but it feels like she’s living life reading off of a script, and she wants more.

Fig instantly regrets wanting more when she turns fourteen. She instantly regrets _not_ being satisfied, because in some way her refusal to be fully content must have led to this. _This_ being the horns sprouting from her head. The horns are decidedly _not_ Figueroth Faeth. They do not represent or channel her, and she’s frankly a little offended that they had the nerve to enter her life. 

She makes do. She styles her hair around them, trades in pastels for leather and flowers for skulls. She rejects the Figueroth of years past, and molds herself a new identity out of heavy metal and plastic from melted guitar picks. She dyes her hair. 

Her mother sighs, and she seems to be more tired every day. Fig counts that as a victory. She’s waging a war with the world and with her mother. Her weapon is a bass guitar, her ammunition is strums and notes and yells, and her target is anyone who’ll listen. 

She hurts, obviously. Fig hurts because of the horn ordeal most recently, but also the insinuations of that, and then three years of unsatisfying happiness. She’s angry at a few specific people, and angry at the world for not handing her content on a silver platter. She wants to be younger again, to _be_ truly happy, or to be young enough that she didn’t realize she wasn’t.

Fig feels, inexplicably, as if she’s wasted a few years. She’s fourteen, and she’s angry, and she’s far too young to be having a crisis like this. Her ink is frustration, and she pens song after song, narrating her bitterness and putting her vexation to tune. 

The worst part is this is probably the most honest Fig has been to herself in years. It feels like less of an act than everything before it — Fig cannot find solace in the fact that this was what broke down her walls, if the cost was tears and arguments and broken trust.

So, Fig is fourteen. The point is, she’s angry. The point is, she doesn’t want this anger to go away, because it paints her more real than she’s felt in years. The point is, she yearns for how uncomplicated things used to be, and she despises the Figueroth of two years prior.

The point is, she’s fourteen, and she’s a little bit lost. Fig doesn’t know what she wants. She just wants _more_.

  
  
  
  
  
  


When she begins attending the Aguefort Adventuring Academy, many things are the same. She’s still fourteen, she’s still angry, and she still doesn’t know what she wants. She’s found allies, _friends_ , in her detention-companions, and this year is shaping up to be a little brighter than the Fig-of-months-prior expected.

She still rebels, of course. Now, her music and her _fuck you_ s to authority are half-bit and half-real emotion, but not a bit or an emotion she’s planning on letting go off yet. She’s still fourteen, and still lost, and the painful truth is that Fig doesn’t know what she’d be _without_ this bit.

The winks and the Sexy Rats and the kissing men twice her age is all fun and games in the moment, but for Fig, they’re all she can identify of this new persona she’s built for herself, and it’s a scary, scary thought to realize you don’t know who you are outside of the act you play. 

There are many, many things Figueroth Faeth does not know about herself. There are a few things she does know, but hides. 

The most major of these are three, immutable facts: 

One: Figueroth Faeth is not comfortable in her skin, not in the slightest.

Two: Fig is bisexual, and nobody knows. Which _shouldn’t_ be a huge deal, because _she_ knows, and that’s what matters, but she’d love to tell somebody.

Three: She has been putting on an act for so long that she has forgotten who she is.

Still, Fig does what she normally does: she makes do. She winks and minor illusions Sexy Rats and plays her bass as loud as she can. She flirts and jokes and sings her _fuck you_ s to the system, and she attends Barbarian practise, because, why the hell not?

It’s fun, and it’s easy, and she gets lost in the new soundtrack of her life. She hides herself behind the Fig persona of this year, and when her friends smile at her antics, things aren’t as bad. She’s more satisfied than she’s ever been, and although she’s still bitter and a little closed-off (her friends claim she’s the most outspoken of all of them, that she’s the _least_ cagey. What do they know?), she doesn’t fake her happiness. 

She meets Gorthalax, her _father_ , she meets him, and it feels like a piece of her puzzle is filled in, and she doesn’t have to act as much anymore.

  
  
  
  
  
  


(The whole _identity crisis_ thing isn’t very subtle. She pretends to be completely different people on a pretty-constant basis, whether that person is Johnny Spells or an inconsequential doctor, or Penelope Everpetal. She hopes her friends would’ve noticed by now and… fixed it for her. She doesn’t know what she wants them to do, but they’re helping Riz find his babysitter and they’re solving such a daunting mystery, it surely shouldn’t be too much to tackle Fig’s minor-in-comparison issue as well, right?

She doesn’t ask. They don’t pick up her hints, or they’re pre-occupied, or she’s acting _too well_ , which is a scary thought but also one she somewhat takes pride in. Fig has never lacked confidence in her acting abilities. She doesn’t want her friends to see a version of her that is _less_ than whatever image she’s projecting now, but she’s also so weary of feeling this way.

  
Figueroth Faeth needs a key change, and quick. She wishes she knew how to get there. She drowns out her insecurities in carefully placed lines and tunes and music, and when it’s just the sound of her bass and Gorgug’s drums, well, things are a little easier.)

  
  
  
  
  


They go to prison. _Prison._ It seems her rebellion has paid off, or reached a peak. Her mother probably never expected this. In the smallest of ways, Fig could count it as a victory.

She’s tired of fighting, though. Rebellion is fine! It’s cool! It’s freeing and Fig feels more herself when she’s striking out against authority than any time else. 

Her mother is a different story. Her issues aren’t solved, and Sandralynn visiting them does not help matters; in fact, it brings them to light. Sometimes, though, Fig just wants to be someone’s daughter. Alienating her family is a good idea in theory, but Fig is fourteen, and seeing Kristen and Adaine makes her feel infinitely grateful for having a mother who will at least _try_ to understand her, even after everything. She doesn’t forgive her mom instantly, of course. Time is a tricky concept, and it will take many, many hours for them to return to what they once were. Fig is prepared to put in the work. 

She has a photo album, now. She sees herself echoed in her mother’s teenage self, and another piece begins to make sense. Maybe current-Fig isn’t as content or as _nice_ as the Fig of years prior, but she feels a lot more real. Real people hurt, and the issues she faces are just proof of her realness.

Take that, twelve-year old Fig! You’ve been rebranded! Pick up your guitar, grab the heaviest metal you can find and press _play_ , no holds barred. The soundtrack is changing, prepare yourself, baby, this is your rock-and-roll moment, a performance lasting months that’ll culminate in a thundering of applause, and with the heat of the stage lights and the pressure of the audience bearing upon you, you’ll have your firework epiphany. You’ll find yourself. It’s coming.

Or, at least, she hopes. Fig isn’t there yet. She wants to be able to see it on the horizon, taste it. She needs some proof that this act she’s putting on will end, and _soon_ . She needs proof that her friends won’t think less of her, that she’ll be able to stand up for what they need and that she’ll be enough. She needs proof that all this has been worth it, that things will get _better_.

She has a photo album from her mother. It makes things better. She has Gorthalax, in some sense of the word. Knowing who he is makes things better.

That’s enough proof for her. 

The show isn’t over yet. Fig rocks on. They find and fight Kalvaxus, and isn’t it fucked up that he was their vice-principal? It only validates her rebellion, because the corpse of a dragon-teacher is enough proof that ‘rebelling against the system’ is an endeavour worth taking. Even with Barbarian classes, she’s helped, and they’ve done it, and they’ve won.

And then she goes on tour.

  
  
  
  
  


(The tour, decidedly, does not help. She’d finally began feeling comfortable with herself, when all of a sudden, she has to be _Fig of the Cig Figs_. 

Asking a teenage girl to be someone else is both too much of an undertaking and uniquely suited to Fig’s skill set. She should not be expected to play a role for fans who don’t care to know the real her. She excels. She throws herself into her _Fig of the Cig Figs_ persona, and allows herself only the slightest honesty with Gorgug in quiet moments caught at night.

“I’m bi, dude.”

  
It’s easy, and it’s freeing, and Gorgug’s quiet acceptance is an anchor. She trades in the comfort with herself she built through a year of high school for a tour and honesty. It’s not a fair trade. She’d make it again.

Fig doesn’t know what she wants, but it decidedly isn’t this. She loves music, though, and although getting lost in the sound is harder, it still works. She’s becoming a little disillusioned, because as much as she loves her band and her music and performing, she still doesn’t know who she is. Isn’t that supposed to have happened by now? How many more strums of guitar and yells and lyrics and performance and stage lights does she need? 

The photo album felt like hope. Gorthalax felt like hope. She has everything she wants, and things aren’t right. This feels like defeat.)

  
  
  
  
  
  


School starts again. It’s largely uneventful, which Fig _should_ be happy about, but isn’t. It was much easier to be comfortable when she was needed for a quest. Now, she’s just a student.

School starts, and it passes worryingly fast. Is she wasting her youth? Is she supposed to be doing more? Sophomore year is a year of mysteries and questions, with very little answers. She keeps her bass by her side, and she attends band practise and sleepovers, and she slips into a routine she isn’t quite comfortable slipping into.

She has her parents. Fig has success, and friends, and a home. There’s no Kalvaxus this year. She hates herself for not being satisfied. 

Spring break comes. This is it. This _has_ to mean something.

She doesn’t know what she’ll do if it _isn’t_.

  
  
  
  
  
  


(She hurts her friends, she wasn’t strong enough to keep it out, wasn’t strong enough to keep Gorthalax safe—

This isn’t the moment she was hoping for. If she could go back to a month prior, and not repeat any of this, she would. She’d be happier living with a false confidence and fake persona than whatever _this_ is. It isn’t supposed to be this real.)

  
  
  
  
  


Fig spends a lot of time with a vague fear hanging over her. It’s not all-consuming, and she grows used to it. Hell, it becomes comfortable after a while.

With her best friends and family sleeping near her in the Hangvan, it’s easy to deal with. The fear presses into her, and it’s terribly, terribly cold. It pricks at her skin, but the skin is _hers_ , and she’s more comfortable in it than not. She’s not quite sure when that happened. It wasn’t as dramatic as she thought it’d be, but she’s grateful for change.

Stage lights, bass guitar, audiences; maybe she doesn’t need the dramatics. Acoustic works, too. 

(And things aren’t good, perse, but they’ve been worse, and if there is anything Fig is confident in, it’s her and her friends’ abilities to beat this. They’ve won before, they’ll do it again. And maybe they’re scared, but this is just the bridge, the intermission — they’re only half[-way to finishing this, and they’re not going down without a fight.)

  
  
  
  
  
  


A bird-woman isn’t the strangest thing Fig has ever seen, far from it. According to her friends, Fig doesn’t really get a judgement on what’s “normal”, anymore, since the whole Sexy Rat debacle; it seems a little unfair, since it happened over a year ago, and Fig was a very different person back then! That being said, though, it _is_ a strange situation, regardless of how used to strange situations Fig has become. 

Still, Fig introduces herself with a _I’m Figueroth Faeth, and we’re taking down the Nightmare King_ . In retrospect, Ayda’s first impression of Fig could’ve been a lot better, but in the moment Fig found it hard to focus on anything apart from the wings. _Maybe_ it’s a little rude to imply that maybe Ayda was the creature her principal had promised to make her, but for said rudeness, Fig received the knowledge that her principal (who is Ayda’s father, what the fuck?) scammed her.

Hopefully, Ayda isn’t too similar to him. That’d be unfortunate.

Still, what Fig finds strange about this situation is not the existence of one Ayda Aguefort, or her relations to a certain principal, or her instant rapport with Adaine, _or_ her wings — none of these things pique Fig’s interest as much as how Ayda’s voice sounds when she says _Figueroth Faeth_. What Fig finds strange is how much she likes hearing her name said like that, and how much she wants to hear Ayda speak more. 

(They bond, and it’s easy, and Fig loves Ayda’s glow. Fig looks at her, and sees someone inexplicably and simply beautiful. It’s instant.  
  
They have a slumber party. Fig means it when she says that she wants to. She’s never had much of an issue with saying what she means. She apologizes for pretending to be Ayda’s father, and isn’t _that_ a statement, when Ayda’s father also happens to be Fig’s principal who _scammed_ her. They talk about Ayda’s parentage. Fig wants to know more about Ayda.

She wonders how many slumber parties they can share without it being overbearing. With Ayda, she feels less like _Fig of the Cig Figs_ , and less like _Fig of Freshman Year_ , and more like _Just Fig_.

_Fig_ is good. It’s comfortable. It’s desirable. Ayda isn’t the sole contributor to this, but the final puzzle piece slips into place. It’s a collage of her friends and achievements and disguises and family, and it fits, so, so well.

A kiss, a skateboard trick, a feather; that feels like hope, too. She’s doing well in that department these days.) 

  
  
  
  
  


_(_ _The fact that I have not found such a quality in myself does not mean that someone as brilliant as Figueroth couldn't find something in me worthwhile._

That’s a song Fig has heard before, echoed by Ayda. It’s wonderful and it makes sense and it’s familiar. It’s an all-consuming comfort. _Brilliant_ . Doesn’t that sound nice. _)_

  
  
  
  
  


The ordeal is over. The battle is won. Another win for the Bad Kids! And Fig is an Archdevil now, how _cool_ is that. She has faced her fears in a much more literal way than expected. She’s sixteen, and she has a girlfriend, and friends, and family. 

Fig listens to metal, these days, because she loves the music and can find herself in it. She listens to love songs, because she can finally understand the lyrics. She listens to what her mother and Gorthalax recommends, and tries to understand them. She listens to the music Jawbone plays in his office, and what Gorgug has on his crystal, and whatever indie band Kristen has managed to scrounge up. She sings and strums and hums along. 

Figueroth Faeth is sixteen. She’s coming to terms with the fact that maybe things aren’t as complex as she once thought. She’s sixteen, and she’s finding herself, and in the meantime, she has a soundtrack she loves. She smiles and laughs and her anxieties aren’t cured, by any means, but maybe she’s fine as she is. She enjoys this, enjoys _life_ , and she doesn’t need a dramatic key change.

She’s loved for who she is. She gets called out when she needs it, and cheered when she deserves it. She’s more than enough. Her audience best get ready, because once she gets started, the whole world will hear her.

This is it. _Freedom_. Youth, love, hope, rebellion. This now, this her? She’s fine with that. She’s more than satisfied. She’s sixteen, and she isn’t compromising on herself anymore. She’ll dance and she’ll sing and she’ll play whatever tune she wants, and no-one will take that from her. 

Figueroth Faeth is sixteen as she settles into writing the first song on an album of her greatest hits. The lyrics are woven into winks and crystal-calls and vinyl records, the tune is transcribed in laughter and love, and everything is falling into place.


End file.
